A Rainbow-Colored Morning

I was back at the lake again for another morning paint session. This was a dramatic sunrise, very impressive with the clouds and all. It is so nice in the mornings - very peaceful and quiet, the sunrise is always interesting and different each time and it's getting cooler in the mornings. This time I painted toward the southwest partially behind a duck blind, hoping to keep the bright sunlight as it came up to my left out of my eyes and not falling on my painting. I don't usually bring my umbrella with me in the mornings.

 As a new experiment I started with an orange toned board figuring it would work with what I usually see at sunrise. Its often kind of dark when I start and although I know where my colors are on the palette, it's often more of a values sort of painting at first, where I am not exactly sure what color I am putting down, because there's not enough light to tell yet. In the semi-dark, alizarin looks exactly like burnt sienna,  and sap green looks identical to ultramarine.

 As it gets slowly brighter from the sunrise the colors I put on the canvas are revealed to me. Sometimes they aren't what I expected; an orange can end up being more pink or more yellow, a dark area can end up being dark purple or dark brown or dark blue-black. Then I have to work with what's there, either going with it or changing it as I paint in the other parts.  I kind of like how it turned out.  Rainbow Dawn, 9 x 12.